


Lockstitch

by TheLionInMyBed



Series: Embroidering the Truth [1]
Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: (mostly implied) - Freeform, Embroidery, Fealty Kink, Fingon loves his gross boyfriend, Fluff and Angst, He just wishes his gross boyfriend loved himself, M/M, Maedhros for once disappointing his grandparents and not his...everyone else, Rough Sex, body image issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-23
Updated: 2016-09-23
Packaged: 2018-08-16 20:57:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,591
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8117314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheLionInMyBed/pseuds/TheLionInMyBed
Summary: While Míriel the Broideress passes her time in Vairë’s service immortalising the great deeds of the House of Finwë, her eldest grandson turns his hand to depicting exploits of a very different nature.





	

**Author's Note:**

> **Lockstitch**  
>  _noun_  
>  1\. a stitch made by a sewing machine by firmly linking together two threads or stitches.

"It's very nice," Fingon said uncertainly, brushing creases out of the sampler.

"Years you've been claiming you want, and I quote, 'a tapestry to immortalise our amorous exploits,' and all you have to say is ‘nice’? I worked my fingers to the bone for you." Maedhros wiggled them demonstratively.

Though they looked no bonier than usual, Fingon caught his wrist and kissed his fingertips. "You did a lovely job." It _was_ a beautiful image, the colours vibrant and well chosen, the stitches as delicate as any Fingon had ever seen. More importantly, the embroiderer had managed to imply real affection in the figures' gestures and expressions, in striking contrast to the straining tension of their limbs. And yet... "I said 'our' exploits, not 'the exploits of me and an indeterminate brunette'."

Maedhros looked innocent. "Red dye is hard to come by in the North."

"You did yourself shorter than me."

"Perspective."

"I can't see your right hand."

"Of course you can't. Neither can I. It's an unfortunate side effect of it no longer being attached to me."

Fingon scowled. "You know what I mean."

"You wanted me to embroider a stump? This was supposed to be aesthetically pleasing."

Fingon caught his other wrist and kissed the scar. "I find you aesthetically pleasing. All of you. Even the missing bits. If I'd wanted only to look at images of myself I would have asked for a mirror."

Maedhros coughed pointedly.

" _Another_ mirror."

"If I looked as you do, I'd never wear clothes." Maedhros freed his left hand to slide it beneath Fingon's robes and caress the firm muscles of his stomach. "In fact you're decidedly overdressed right now."

"Don't think I don't notice you trying to distract me," Fingon said sternly, although he let the hand remain in place.

"It's a political matter. If anyone else were to see it-"

"Is there a soul in this kingdom that doesn't suspect?" Fingon pulled him close which hampered the continued explorations of Maedhros' hand but was worth it to feel inch of that lean body pressed against him. "We've never been that circumspect and your brother's songs really aren't as subtle as he likes to think."

"Sometimes a sword is just a sword," Maedhros said, hand closing around something that was decidedly not.

"And sometimes it's my penis."

"Mm. Still. Plausible deniability is a wonderful thing."

It was with a good deal of regret that Fingon released him and stepped back. "Do it properly. Please."

"As my lord commands." A flick of a knife and Fingon's partner was missing his face. Even left handed Maedhros was dexterous, his stitches nearly as precise as his grandmother's must once have been, and Fingon watched with unfeigned pleasure until he recognised the features taking shape beneath the needle.

It was indeed Maedhros - even with the hair still brown, the sharp features and sharper smile were unmistakable. But it was a Maedhros with a straight nose and high cheekbones that had never been shattered by a mailed fist. A Maedhros who had not been hollowed into gauntness by hunger and exhaustion and fear. A Maedhros who had not yet suffered, who scarcely knew what suffering was.

Fingon recoiled from it, feeling a horror he could scarcely find the words for. "Do you think _that's_ what I see in you?"

Maedhros stared at him with eyes that were as grey as that long ago boy's and utterly unlike them in every way that mattered. "I'm not going to stitch you in flagrante with an orc. What would my grandmother say?"

" _Maedhros!_ "

"Probably that, yes. This isn't about my looks - they're perfectly adequate for terrorising the Enemy's forces. This is about my artistic sensibilities."

Fingon had first brought up the subject of erotic tapestries as a joke and then continued to bring it up because Maedhros' combination of professional indignation and poorly-concealed embarrassment never ceased to be amusing. He had not thought the embarrassment a mask for _this_. He saw all the ways he might argue against Maedhros' assessment of himself and all the calm, sarcastic responses that Maedhros would make laid out before him, more horrible than the bright threads of the tapestry. He did not know what to say.

"Fingon?" Maedhros said, when he had failed to reply too long.

"Don't call yourself that. Please."

"What? An artist?" But he plainly saw that he had gone too far. "As you wish. I won't mention it again."

An hour ago Fingon had imagined an evening spent drinking, joking and then retiring to his bed to enact scenes from the entirely theoretical tapestry. It was rare enough that they were together, rarer still that their time was not taken up with matters of state, and he had intended to enjoy it. But the idea of lying with Maedhros now - lying with him while he was under the impression Fingon was imagining someone entirely different - turned his stomach.

"I think I shall retire," he said, rising and stretching ostentatiously.

Maedhros gave him a strange, shuttered look and wished him a good night.

***

He woke to Maedhros prodding him in the ribs.

"Fingon. _Fingon_."

"Mph."

"Are you awake?" Maedhros was a dark silhouette against the star-stitched sky seen through the window.

"I am now. What is it?"

"Why?"

"Why what?"

Maedhros' eyes shone in the darkness in a way that no Elf's, not even one that had seen the Trees, ever would. "The scars? The stump? Why would you want that?"

Fingon stifled a groan. This was a conversation difficult enough by the light of day, never mind while he was half asleep. "I love you. _You,_ as you are, not some ideal that I made up. I thought you knew that."

"You're a fool," Maedhros said but any argument Fingon might have made was stifled by the sudden press of Maedhros' mouth against his.

It was a hungry kiss and searching, as though Maedhros thought he could taste the truth of Fingon's words upon his tongue. He bit down on Fingon's lip, not hard but his teeth were very sharp, so sharp that Fingon's mouth filled with the salt-sweet tang of blood.

"You're a fool," Maedhros said again and licked his lips.

Fingon grinned into the dark. "I'm a man who knows exactly what he wants." He threaded his hands through Maedhros' hair and tried to drag him down into another kiss but Maedhros would not be moved. It was pointless to pout or roll his eyes but Fingon did so anyway. Maedhros laughed softly and Fingon realised he had seen it. That he could, apparently, see much more of Fingon in the dark than Fingon could of him.

"That's hardly fair," he muttered, and then a hand closed about his shoulder, and he was rolled and pressed down into the mattress, Maedhros' weight settling upon the small of his back.

"Better?" Maedhros whispered in his ear.

He was strong - Fingon knew that from half a hundred battlefields and sparring matches - but had never before made a demonstration of it in their bed. "I like it when you take command," Maedhros had once said. And then added, in a low, rough voice, "My lord," so that Fingon had not thought to question him further. He wondered at that now.

Experimentally, Fingon tried to turn back over, to struggle out from under him, but was arrested by a hand tangled in the braids at the back of his neck and Maedhros' lips at the corner of his jaw. That and the chafe of Fingon's cock against the sheets beneath him kept him there as Maedhros sucked a bruise onto his throat.

"I don't have many robes with high collars," Fingon gasped. "You're severely limiting tomorrow's wardrobe options."

"Tell me to stop," Maedhros said, quiet and very serious.

"Sometimes it's like you don't know me at- _ah!_ " Sharp teeth sank into the point of his ear, the pain soothed away by the wet heat of Maedhros’ mouth and the lap of his tongue.

"Hush," he said, sitting back. His fingers stroked down Fingon's spine, making him shiver and strain helplessly up into the touch. "Shall I gag you? I think perhaps I shall. My lord."

***

Fingon woke to a body that ached as sorely and as pleasantly as if he’d fought the Dagor Aglareb a second time over and, more disconcertingly, an empty bed. Maedhros did not sleep well or often but on those nights they spent together he would always stay with Fingon till he woke.

He staggered from the bed and almost tripped over Maedhros, who was sat upon the floor before Fingon's largest mirror, wrapped in the robe that Fingon had cast aside the night before.

"I had to get the scars right," he said by way of explanation, biting off a thread. "Here." And, without looking at him, he handed Fingon another scrap of embroidery. It was not as pretty as the previous piece; the colours were as vibrant, the stitching just as delicate, but the subjects wore expressions more appropriate to a fight than a love scene. Fingon looked the same as in the previous piece; a strong, handsome face beneath hawk like brows. This time though, Maedhros had done himself as he was; short haired and sharp toothed and very scarred. Not beautiful but fierce, resilient and everything Fingon had ever wanted.

" _There_ you are," said Fingon, feeling far more touched than was probably appropriate for a man holding a piece of pornographic embroidery.

Maedhros smiled, ugly and lovely and almost shy, and set the needle aside.


End file.
